FISH AND GAME 



217 



on all big g-ame closes, the mountains of Montana contain thousands of 

 hunters, some camping for a few days and others out for a 

 Big Game month or six weeks' trip, systematically bagging all the differ- 

 and Wild ent varieties of birds and animals permitted to be killed under 

 Fowl the law. The season on grouse, prairie chicken, sage hens, 



Abound pheasants and fool hens is during the month of October. Large 



Hereabouts, game, elk. deer, goats and sheep may be hunted in October 

 and November. There is no closed season on bear, which are 

 often the coveited quarry of local and eastern sportsmen, during the months 

 of April, May and the early part of June. At this time, especially during 

 the month of May, the skins are prime. The animals have just finished 



A Day's Shooting 



their winter hibernation. When they first emerge from their long retreat, 

 they are in fairly good flesh, and ravenously hungry. Unless they imme- 

 diately find food in considerable quantity, they rapidly lose flesh and in 

 a few days are thin and gaunt. It is at this time that bear travel over a 

 large area in twenty-four hours in quest of meals and it is at this season 

 that they are most fierce and seldom seek to avoid an encounter with their 

 natural enemy — ^man — especially those of the Grizzly or Silver Tip vairieties, 

 consequently to the hunter, in addition to procuring pelts in their primest 

 condition, is the addest zest of dangerous sport. 



Bear are native to all the mountainous region of the state, but prob- 

 ably the greatest numbers are found in the counties adjacent to the Yel- 



— It won't do your hoy any good to tell him of the land you might have taken. 



